


The Last Surprise

by Path



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures, Problem Sleuth (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-07
Updated: 2011-10-07
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:36:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/261885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Path/pseuds/Path
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's well after three in the morning when Clubs Deuce knocks on your door and says you'd better come, because Slick is in trouble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Surprise

**Author's Note:**

> Sannam keeps me busy writing with her adorable art of gangstercuddles

It's well past three in the morning when you're awakened by frantic knocking on the door. You stumble up and answer the door in boxers, undershirt, and revolver. You find a gun is a good accessory for anything.

Clubs Deuce stands on the step, fumbling his hat in his hands. When your eyes meet, his don't light up. "It's the boss, Problem Sleuth," he says. "I'm supposed to come get you."

He gives you a few minutes to get dressed, pulling on pants and a shirt you don't bother to tuck in. Your heart and brain are both racing, trying to balance out the worst from the likely. When you emerge from your room, buckling your belt as you go, Deuce looks up from where he'd been sitting on the couch, head in his hands. You're beginning to fear that the likely and the worst are the same thing.

Deuce drives; an exercise in saying your prayers. You don't remember anything formal, but "I don't want to die" is probably pretty universal anyhow. He pulls up beside a nondescript bar and gestures you out with a tip of his head. The manhole cover in the street is removed; Deuce just calls "It's me," down it, and as an afterthought, "I brought him."

You'd always thought the Midnight Crew probably had some complicated password system. You guess nobody could really impersonate Clubs Deuce.

Your brain is really looking for something else to seize on here. Little details keep jumping out at you; the city's name inscribed on the manhole cover, the little feather in Deuce's hat that might have once been a colour that wasn't grey. You wish your mind would kick into this gear on cases, and not when... when whatever this is happens.

Descend.

Hearts Boxcars is waiting at the bottom of the ladder in. By the time you get down, he and Deuce are sitting on a somewhat imbalanced sofa. You thought your couch had seen better days; you guess it didn't have to deal with the entire Midnight Crew. Just the leader.

Deuce has his head in his hands, Boxcars with a hand on his back. "It'll work out," he says to Deuce. His voice is a low rumble that isn't meant for you in the same way that an earthquake isn't meant for the next town over. You still feel it through your shoes.

Boxcars escorts you, now. "Can you, uh," you ask awkwardly, afraid to speak in the silence, "can you tell me what's going on?"

He looks down and you and smiles, rueful and sick. "It's just 'round the corner," he says. "Droog'll fill you in."

And then you're there, the hideout not the impossible warren of rabbit tunnels you'd expected but just a couple rooms off the hall. Diamonds Droog is standing in front of a beaten-up door with a spade painted on it. Boxcars pats Droog on the shoulder, once, shakes your hand, and trudges back to the main room. Your heart is starting to slow down now. It's coming to terms with the last surprise.

Droog sizes you up, cool grey eyes skimming you and expressing some amount of disapproval.

"Came as soon as I could," you say, and your voice wants to forget how to work.

Droog's left eye twitches. It's the only time you've ever seen him respond to words. "Soon enough, I suppose," he admits. He puts a hand on the doorknob, but doesn't turn it. He looks at you again and something seems to drop from in front of his eyes. "I'm only doing this because he asked for you," he says.

"What ha-" you get out, before the door is open and Droog pushes you into it.

The door closes behind you, and you're left in darkness. Your eyes begin to adjust, but it takes a minute. You almost reach for the light switch, but your nose catches something, and your hand pauses midair.

It smells like blood. Blood, sweat, something thick and cloying, but mostly blood. You're not sure you want to have it all revealed to you in fluorescence. You pull your hand back and squint your eyes closed for a moment, trying to speed along the adaptation.

When you open them again, you catch dim shapes. Bed- you extend your hand, and it settles on the rail. Table. Things near the corners sink into shadows you're not sure would vanish even with the lights on. With something else to focus on and your heart slowing down a bit, something you'd missed when you stumbled in here sifts up to the surface.

Breathing.

"Slick," you say instantly, the second your heart starts beating again. "Slick."

There's a faint answer, of sorts; a low halting sound interrupts the regular breathing for a moment. You make your way around the bed and sit down near the head. You can make him out now, a vague dark shape silhouetted with what light comes in under the door. "Slick," you say.  
Another sound, a waking-up sound you'd find kind of adorable if whatever this was wasn't happening. "Mmf," he says a moment later, voice cracking. "You there?"

"Yeah," you say. "Here." He whimpers, and you feel it impact into your stomach. You'd never have been able to imagine him making a sound like that. "Hey," you say. "Hey. Slick, I got you." Then you're shucking your trench coat and shoes and laying down beside him, careful still to not touch.

"What happened?" you ask in the dark.

"What-" you can almost hear him trying to get his thoughts in order. His words are slurred. He took forever to wake up. He's probably heavily drugged. "What'd they tellya?"

"Nothing."

"Oh," he says, and another long pause. "Took m'eye out. An' the arm. 'S what happened."

You take a moment to process this. "Wait, they took out your _eye_? And what happened to your arm?"

He sighs, and fumbles in the dark against you, grabbing your hand in his left. He guides it to his face. Fingers want to twitch, to touch him, but you keep them carefully still while he moves your hand for you. From forehead to jaw on one side, normal, and then he lifts your hand and places it on the other side to repeat. You can feel the difference before your fingers leave his hairline, the skin hot and swollen. Your fingers hit medical tape, gauze just above his eyebrow, then down over a mass of padding. You take in a breath. The padding thins out, and a little below his cheekbone, stops. His fingers are clamped around your wrist. Even drugged to avoid what must be debilitating amounts of pain, Slick could break your wrist with minimal effort.

"...shit," you say, but he keeps moving, your hand grazing over his jaw, down his neck, across his collarbones to the opposite shoulder. You can feel scars in his skin, the same ones as always. Your fingers trace over patches burned smooth, raised snaking lines, rough hash marks. This is the part of Slick you're familiar with, though you were never wholly comfortable with it. Your fingers crest his shoulder, and his hand around your wrist begins to shake. Beneath your fingers, his arm twitches.

Your fingers bump into padding, and Slick hisses in a breath and clamps his teeth together. You raise your hand and twist out of his death grip; waste your time for a minute trying to figure out where his arm starts up again and how much got taken out of it, before it suddenly hits you that there's nothing below that. Padded stump.

Your stomach shrinks away in horror. He had pinpoint accuracy with a blade in his right. He used to grab your collar in one hand and shove the knife up to your throat with the other, and he could hold his hand still enough that it'd touch but never draw blood, no matter how sharp the knife. That's his treble clef hand, you think, how is he going to play now?

Before you can think more horrible thoughts about what he's lost, you've pulled him in, wrapping both arms around him. One slides into his hair, the other around his side, pulling him close. You can feel the bandages nestling into your elbow and again, your stomach churns sickly. You bury your face in his hair and mutter to him, "I'm sorry, Slick, shit, I'm sorry..."

His remaining hand curls in front of him, flat between your chests. His fingers twitch, press into your arm. He sighs again.

A few minutes, and his breathing is close to natural again. When you say his name softly, he doesn't respond. You squeeze him closer and listen to the slight shift in his breathing, and you kiss his forehead.

And at some point, beyond all expectation, you sleep too.


End file.
